The value of photographs - and why they're worth preserving

I want to write about the value of photographs - and why they're worth preserving. 

(Those of you who know me and have heard this already may like to browse Wikipedia now or make a cup of tea.)

The poor souls who attend my Digital Photography classes at Erindale are told with some apparent authority by yours truly that a photograph has value if it was one or more of the following characteristics:

• it's fine art. Not many of us produce a lot of this, unfortunately;
• it's of value to you. The grandparent's shot of a grandchild (or vise versa) is a classic example; or
• it's a record of something of value that has been lost.

It's this third point that was reinforced for me recently.

It's Canberra's 100th birthday on 12 March 2013 and for those of you not familiar with the history of our wide brown land, it had a troubled beginning. While it was proclaimed in 1913, due to two world wars, the Great Depression and indifference from much of Australia, it wasn't really developed until the 1960s.

I recently saw some photographs made from the 1910s through to the 1970s showing Canberra "before". These images were accompanied by very good attempts to make the same image from the same vantage point - using landmarks to try to orientated the photographer. The whole show was quite fascinating.

Now these images were workman-like shots, but they were made for a purpose - and that purpose wasn't great art. They were intended as a record only. And it's well that they were made because they are a record of places and indeed, people who are gone forever. Nothing will bring that place back. Even if the unthinkable (and highly improbable) were to take place and mankind were to be wiped out by some catastrophe, the place where Canberra now sits will never look as it did in 1913 - or in 1960.

So my point is that even the most mundane snaps have value as they will inevitably record - and in a sense, preserve - someone or something that is no-longer with us.

And this brings me to another of my hobby horses: an image is only useful if it's preserved and can be found.

These images were preserved because they had been made by a government agency and carefully stored and catalogued. If they had been treated as are so many images made today, I'm sure they would be lost - and so would their value.

When attending big public events, I wonder at the number of people using their phones as cameras. Don't get me wrong - most of the smart phones these days have very capable photographic capability - but what happens then? Are these images stored, or are they uploaded (and down sampled) on Facebook, perhaps? Maybe they're sent by email or SMS - but are they kept? We are told that more photography is taking place now than ever before, but where will the images of the people and places that are gone forever be found in 10, 20 or 100 years?

So my thought for the day is: whatever means you use to capture those "snaps" of family, friends and places: save and protect them for the future!

Thanks for reading this through to the end.  I'll have a little lie down now ...

Shane